NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C. — Paint peels and memories fade but the echoes of the past still ring off the hillsides here.
Twenty years ago today, the checkered flag fell on the final NASCAR premier series race at North Wilkesboro Speedway.
Bob Flock won the first race, in 1949 and on dirt. Jeff Gordon won the last, in 1996 and on asphalt. The two races serve as bookends for a track that even after 20 years of silence serves as a reminder of the sport’s colorful past.
For 48 years and 93 races, NASCAR teams made the trek to the secluded .625-mile track in the Brushy Mountains of northwestern North Carolina.
“It’s one of the sport’s most historic tracks, one that really helped put NASCAR on the map,” car owner Richard Childress said. “A lot of people overlook that. But a lot of great things happened there. (Former series sponsor) R.J. Reynolds really supported it; Holly Farms back in the day … all those things were important to building our sport to what it is today.”
Built by Wilkes County resident Enoch Staley and partners Lawson Curry and Jack and Charlie Combs, North Wilkesboro Speedway was a venue unlike any other — in part because the front straightaway ran slightly downhill and the backstretch uphill.
It opened in 1947, two years before the debut of NASCAR’s Strictly Stock Series, and hosted its first NASCAR premier series event in October of ’49.
The Wilkes 200 featured a 22-car field and was the final race of the inaugural season for NASCAR’s new featured series. Flock won the race but it was Red Byron, finishing 16th, who captured the series’ first championship.
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‘I felt like I was lost’
Thirty-eight drivers made it to Victory Lane at North Wilkesboro through the years, including 19 members currently in the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Richard Petty mastered the track, winning a record 15 times; Darrell Waltrip won 10 times.
No active full-time driver competing in the premier series today made a single start at the track.
Gordon was the last to win at North Wilkesboro in NASCAR’s top division and the last active driver to compete there.
“I saw somewhere this year the last eight laps or so of the (final) race,” Gordon told NASCAR.com. “That’s the cool thing about it. If you look at the cars, there were no splitters, the air dams weren’t on the ground, nothing was all sealed up. It was all about mechanical grip. Springs and shocks played a role. The driver played a role. Managing the tires and the brakes played a role. It was nice to be able to go there and focus on those things.
“North Wilkesboro was probably one of the most challenging short tracks that we went to. Hard to get ahold of, very slick, really unique. The banking and radius of the corners as well as the uphill, downhill aspect of it. It was just really old school. Very old school and I felt like I was lost the first couple of times that I went there.
“That’s why that pole meant a lot to me the year before, because I felt like ‘Boy, I don’t know if I have what it takes to get around this track’ and then the next year to win the race? I’m sure that’s what was going through my mind; I thought I’d never win at this place.”
Ray Evernham helped guide Gordon to three championships as crew chief of the No. 24 Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports. But it took some doing, and eight career starts, before the duo solved the riddle of the unique little track.
“I just loved that place,” Evernham said. “The fact that it would change throughout the day and you really had to manage your car and you really, honestly, had to worry about mechanical grip back then. The fact that it was two completely different corners. Any of the tracks that had a real history to me and were real challenging were tracks I really wanted to win at. Just because of the design and surface (at North Wilkesboro), it didn’t matter if you had a good motor, none of that mattered.
“It was really about the pureness of what stock car racing was — you had to get your car to handle, you had to get your driver to hang in there, your pit crew guys had to be good. It wasn’t about all the latest and greatest technology; it was about pure racing.”
Through the years
North Wilkesboro Speedway was the site of so much throughout its four-plus decades as a part of NASCAR’s annual schedule. Close finishes and close calls; rivalries renewed and rivalries begun; and at least one finish that’s memorable because it wasn’t close at all.
Just a few that stand out:
• The spring race of 1955, the Wilkes County 160, saw Buck Baker edge Dick Rathmann for the win. The margin of victory, officially 3 feet, was the closest winning margin in the seven-year history of the series.
• Two years later, in the spring of 1957, Fireball Roberts won the 100-mile race without making a single pit stop. The big news, though, was that this was the last race on dirt at North Wilkesboro.
• Lee Petty’s first North Wilkesboro win came in 1959. And it was his only victory with the Petty Enterprises’ No. 43, a number later made somewhat famous by his son, Richard.
• The win for Junior Johnson in October of 1965 was the hometown favorite’s 50th and final as a driver. In all, Johnson won four times at North Wilkesboro. His teams went on to earn 15 more victories with the Ingle Hollow, North Carolina, native as an owner.
• On Oct. 1, 1967, Richard Petty won the Wilkes 400 for his 10th consecutive victory and his 27th on the season. Both records remain unmatched.
• Another Petty item — this one involving Bobby Allison, who was one of the King’s biggest rivals back in the day — took place in ’72.
“There wasn’t a winner’s circle; you just stopped on the race track,” Petty’s championship winning crew chief Dale Inman recalled. “I guess Richard and Bobby, the last five or six laps got to bumping each other; got to bumping each other pretty hard.
“We just stopped on the race track and that was the winner’s circle. Richard got out of the car and handed Maurice (Petty, Richard’s brother and the team’s engine builder) his helmet and somebody came up and put their hands on Richard. Maurice hit him right in the face with the helmet.
“When Maurice hit him, he staggered over and I caught him. He said, ‘What’d he hit me for?’ I said, ‘Hell, I don’t know.’ “
• In 1989, Goodyear officials successfully debuted the company’s radial race tire in a race won by Dale Earnhardt.
Earnhardt won five times at North Wilkesboro and finished second on six occasions. It was a rare race that didn’t see the “Intimidator” in contention, much as Waltrip and Petty had been dominant earlier.
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Earnhardt passed us so often one time there we thought there were two of ’em on the track,” said Wood Brothers Racing co-owner Eddie Wood.
• The Tyson Holly Farms 400 in 1994 featured only one driver on the lead lap at the finish — race winner Geoffrey Bodine. It was the last premier series event in which the winner lapped the entire field.
• Terry Labonte tied Richard Petty’s consecutive starts record at North Wilkesboro; Ernie Irvan returned to competition at the track after being critically injured 14 months earlier; Harry Gant’s streak of four consecutive wins in the month of September came to an end at North Wilkesboro.
So much happened at such a tiny facility. But that was what made the track so enjoyable and so memorable.
‘Just an awesome race track’
Former NBA all-star Brad Daugherty became a race fan in part because of the numerous treks with family to watch the NASCAR races at North Wilkesboro. Today he remains involved in college basketball and the NBA as an analyst for ESPN.
He’s also involved in NASCAR — he’s the Daugherty in the JTG Daugherty Racing team that fields the No. 47 Sprint Cup team with driver AJ Allmendinger.
“I used to go there a lot … I mean we went every year,” Daugherty said. “We’d go watch that Holly Farms race every year. Just awesome.
“Actually that’s where I got to know Junior Johnson really well as a young fella. Me and my dad and my uncle, I’ve got to give my uncle all the credit, we used to go to North Wilkesboro and Bristol a lot. But he loved going to North Wilkesboro and I did, too. It was great. We’d spend all day, driving over from Asheville, winding our way up through there and getting to the race track.
“I remember getting there and seeing all the cars — the Tide car, the Levi Garrett car, the Skoal car. It was just a wonderful race track and I was just so disappointed that it went away. It was just an awesome race track.”
Childress, an owner/driver for just over a decade before turning his attention solely to ownership, called the track “one of my favorites.”
“That and Martinsville were my two home tracks,” the Winston-Salem, North Carolina, native said. “I had some good runs and good finishes there. The fans, how they got into it, was just amazing. Those fans were true to Junior Johnson. It was just quite a deal to go back up there and race.
“I can remember back when I ran there; I remember spinning out one time, it had just rained and the track was wet. Enoch Staley owned the track … I never will forget. I spun out, went across the grass back there on the back side of the track and tore down one of his fences.
“He came over there raising hell about me tearing down his fence; he didn’t care anything about the fact that I had my old car torn all to pieces. But that’s just the way he was.”
One last hurrah
The weekend of Sept. 27-29, 1996, was the final NASCAR race weekend at North Wilkesboro. Two races were held — the Lowe’s 250 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race on Saturday followed by Sunday’s Tyson Holly Farms 400.
The Truck Series race was stop No. 20 of 24 for the season and it was just the second time the series visited the legendary facility.
Sunday’s premier series race was No. 27 of 31 for the 1996 season. It was the last season in which the schedule consisted of 31 races. The following year at the request of the track’s new owners, the spring date at North Wilkesboro was moved to Texas Motor Speedway while the fall date went in as the second of two dates at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
Friday, Sept. 27: Following a 3 p.m. ET start, rain interrupted first-round qualifying with 13 of 40 drivers still waiting to get on track. Bobby Hamilton, driving the popular No. 43 Pontiac fielded by Petty Enterprises, was fastest before the delay.
After a 2 1/2-hour wait, Gordon was first out on the track, and the defending series champion quickly put his Chevrolet on top with a lap of 117.937 mph. The run held until Ted Musgrave, driving the No. 16 Family Channel/Primestar Ford Thunderbird for car owner Jack Roush, won the pole with a lap of 118.054 mph. It was Musgrave’s first pole of the season and the fifth and final No. 1 starting spot of his career.
Hamilton wound up third, with Mark Martin and Irvan completing the top five.
In the Truck Series, all but five drivers had made qualifying attempts when rain returned and darkness forced officials to postpone the remainder of the program until Saturday. Rookie Johnny Benson had the fastest lap when qualifying was stopped. Rain was in the Saturday forecast and had it continued, leaving officials to set the lineup by the rule book, Benson would have failed to qualify as he had only two previous starts that season.
Saturday, Sept. 28: Second-round qualifying was still in place for the Cup Series, allowing drivers to stand on their first-round times or make a second attempt. Only the top 25 locked in times from first round the previous day. The practice was done away with following the 2000 season, with only one round used to determine the lineup.
Six drivers made second-round attempts, with Hut Stricklin fastest and Dale Jarrett also improving on his first day’s effort. Provisionals went to Bodine, Lake Speed, Robert Pressley, Jeff Green and Darrell Waltrip (past champion’s provisional).
Ward Burton, Dick Trickle and Gary Bradberry failed to qualify.
Rain following the Truck Series race cut short final practice for Cup teams. Gordon completed just 15 laps when his car developed engine problems, later traced to debris in the carburetor.
In the Truck Series race later that day, Mark Martin won in just his second start in the series to become only the third driver at that time to win at least one race in all three of NASCAR’s national tours.
For posterity, the entire field posed for a picture prior to the last race at the fabled .625-mile track.
Sunday, Sept. 29: More than 40,000 fans were on hand to witness the final premier series race at North Wilkesboro. Many carried signs with, “We’ll miss you North Wilkesboro,” “Farewell Old Friend” or similar messages.
Television coverage was provided by ESPN Speedworld; it was the 30th premier series race broadcast from the track by the network, which had begun airing races from Wilkesboro in 1982.
The race featured eight different leaders, but it was Gordon who had the dominant car. He led at halfway, collecting a $10,000 bonus, and moved past Earnhardt after a restart with 79 laps remaining to grab the lead for the final time.
When the checkered flag appeared, it was Gordon across the stripe first, with Earnhardt, Jarrett, Jeff Burton and Labonte rounding out the top five.
Evernham said the win was special because “we knew it was going to be the last race there.”
“For a little bit of time there the short tracks had almost been our Achilles’ heel and we got a handle on it,” he said. “And that’s the year we won 10 races, so we were pretty proud of that accomplishment; I was really proud of that even though we had won the championship in ’95. I felt like we were becoming one of the dominant teams.
“When you could beat guys like (Dale) Earnhardt, Junior Johnson’s cars and those people at North Wilkesboro, you deserved to be there.”
In addition to being his 10th win of the season, it was also Gordon’s third in a row, coming on the heels of victories at Dover and Martinsville.
“We were on a pretty good roll that year,” Gordon said. “Winning wasn’t outside of the realm but at the same time, knowing it was the last race there … now looking back on it, it’s extremely special to me because it was the last race and because it was such a tough, challenging race track.
“To be good on the short tracks meant a lot back then.”
Bill Brodrick, known as the Hat Man, was waiting in Victory Lane, situated on top of a building in the infield. So, too, was team owner Rick Hendrick and the rest of Gordon’s crew.
Several hours later, the gates swung shut at North Wilkesboro Speedway. The fans had departed. And this time, NASCAR had, too.
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